Top Smartwatch Daily Activities: Fitness Tracking, Notifications

by , Staff Writer, November 3, 2016

Top Smartwatch Daily Activities: Fitness Tracking, Notifications

The idea of consumers treating smartwatches as voice communication devices to make and receive phone calls hasn’t quite materialized.

Rather, smartwatches are being used more as devices for activity tracking and text-based communication, based on a new study.

Last on the list of what people’s daily smartwatch activity is making or receiving phone calls, according to the study by Parks Associates.

One in 10 broadband households now has a smartwatch and more than a third (39%) of them are Apple devices.

Those with Apple Watches tend to do more with their watches, according to the study. For example, here are the daily activities of owners of all smartwatches other than Apple, in order:

  1. Track fitness activities
  2. Receive email, text notifications and social media updates
  3. Lock or unlock a car door
  4. Use home control/automation features
  5. Search for information using voice commands
  6. Make or receive phone calls through the watch

More Apple Watch owners do almost all those activities more than other smartwatch owners.

There also are differences in weekly actions.

For example, 50% of Apple Watch owners check the weather weekly compared to 29% of non-Apple smartwatch owners.

More than half (56%) of Apple Watch owners reply to notification on their device each week compared to 20% of non-Apple smartwatch owners.

And 31% of those with an Apple Watch search for information using voice commands weekly compared to 19% of non-Apple smartwatch owners.

So it all comes down to the primary use cases being fitness tracking and notifications, although Parks says mobile payments, smart home and security are emerging.

But then again, the U.S. smartwatch market is still just at 10%.

 

MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily

(15)